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Home office remodeling for a cognitive disability

When doing home office remodeling for a cognitive disability, learn more about accommodating disabilities that affect memory and decision-making skills.

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Watch the glare when doing a home office remodeling for a cognitive disability. Photo by TomBorowski on Fllickr.Cognitive impairments affect the ability to think and make good decisions. They also cause problems with language and memory. When doing home office remodeling for a cognitive disability, learn more about accommodating disabilities that affect memory and decision-making skills.

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Because people with cognitive disabilities might also have hearing problems, it is important to equip a home office with tools a person can use to limit the effects of these difficulties. When completing a residential renovation project, consider installing a doorbell signaler in your home office. This device attaches to a lamp and makes it easier for someone with hearing loss to know when the doorbell is ringing.

Installing specialized communication equipment is another way to modify a home office for someone with a cognitive disability. Before starting your project, find out if you need to run new telephone lines for this equipment.

People with disabilities that affect cognitive skills are also more susceptible to the effects of glare. Sudden changes in lighting conditions affect people with Alzheimer's disease and similar conditions.

When doing home office remodeling, cognition disability should be one of the factors you consider when developing a lighting plan. Install light sources that do not produce glare, as glare can distort perception and cause confusion. If you use overhead lighting, make sure each light source has a cover. If you use lamps, their shades should soften the light and prevent glare on desks and other office surfaces.

Those with Alzheimer's disease and other cognition disabilities also have an increased risk of falls, so it is important to renovate the home office with this in mind. You might have to hire an electrician to install new outlets, as the use of extension cords and power strips can create a fall hazard.

People with disabilities might also have to contend with cataracts or other vision problems, so use contrasting colors when installing new flooring in a home office. For instance, strips of tape that contrast with the surrounding flooring can help people with cognition disabilities remember to pick up their feet when walking across doorsills or leaving the office to enter other areas of the home.

When doing home office remodeling, cognition disability also makes it necessary to choose flooring carefully. Alzheimer's disease and similar disabilities affect depth and color perception, so you must choose flooring that minimizes the risk of falls and makes it easier for the person to get around.

Choose rugs in light colors instead of dark ones, as dark rugs might appear as black holes in the floor.

It has been suggested that people with Alzheimer's disease have the easiest time distinguishing red from other colors, so ask your contractor to paint the baseboard red to set it apart from carpeting and other flooring.

Avoid carpeting with patterns, as the patterns can cause confusion.

Remodeling the home office is just one way to help people with cognition disabilities stay in their own homes. It is important to work with a reputable contractor when doing a home office remodeling for a cognitive disability project, so use Reply! to find a contractor with a good reputation.

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Photo credit: TomBorowski via Compfight CC.